Antrodia cinnamomea is a perennial fungus under the classification of Aphyllophorales, Polyporaceae, and Antrodia. It is an unique Taiwanese fungus only grown on Taiwanese Cinnamomum kanehirae Hay. Antrodia cinnamomea is a special and precious medicinal fungus as well as the most expensive wild fungus nowadays in Taiwan. The first publication of Antrodia cinnamomea is in 1990, when Zhang and Su presented Antrodia cinnamomea fruiting body with contaminated Ganoderma spores and grouped it as a new species under Ganoderma commmphoratum Zang & Su. In 1995, the second new species reported by Chang and Chou based on morphology and cultivation features of Antrodia cinnamomea. Particularly, they discovered that Antrodia cinnamomea is wood brown rot fungus, and classified it as a new species Antrodia cinnamomea Chang T T & W N Chou under Antrodia. In 1997, the third new species publication renamed this species as Antrodia cinnamomea by Wu. In 2004, based on ICBN Article 9. 12 (Greuter et al., 2000), Chang and Chou disregarded the misleading Ganoderma comphoratum and Antrodia camphorate, and recovered to Antrodia cinnamomea. 
Research has shown that the extract from Antrodia cinnamomea fruiting body contains three triterpene compounds which are antcin A, antcin B and antcin C. Three new triterpene compounds has been identified in further research as antrocin, 4,7-dimethoxy-5-methyl-1,3-benzodioxole, and 2,2′,5,5′-tetramethoxy-3,4,3′,4′-bimethyl-enedioxy-6,6′-dimethylbiphenyl. In 1996, another four new triterpene compounds have been found such as antcin E, antcin F, methylantcinate G, and methylanticinate H. In 1996, two ergostane based new compounds were identified from fruiting body extract, such as zhankuic acid D and zhankuic acid E; and three lanostane based new compounds were identified from fruiting body extract as 15α-acetyl-dehydro-sulphurenic acid, dehydroeburicoic acid, and dehydro-sulphurenic acid.
Based on previous research, it is known that Antrodia cinnamomea contains complex compounds. Besides triterpene, it contains lots of physiological active substances such as polysaccharides, SOD, adenosine, small molecular protein, vitamin, trace elements, nucleic acid, steroid, blood pressure stabilizing substance, and etc. Previous research revealed that Antrodia cinnamomea contains unique triterpene compounds, although their activity of anti-cancer cell growth and neuron cell growth activation is not fully discovered yet.
Because wild Antrodia cinnamomea grows in dark, damp, low temperature condition of middle altitude mountainous regions accompanied with its long growth period (over one year), the time to produce fruiting body is very long. Cinnamomum kanehirae Hay. and wild Antrodia cinnamomea are reserved plants, and current artificial cultivation method is not able to provide mass cultivation and biological activity simultaneously. Besides, serious stealing issue of wild Antrodia cinnamomea brings this species the crisis of extinction. Currently, there are three cultivation methods: liquid fermentation, solid cultivation and wood cultivation. Liquid fermentation is used in early stage mainly in industry and academia which is good for mass production with short cultivation time, high yield, and high carbohydrate content in general. However, this method can not produce the effective triterpene compounds. Therefore, the research is restricted to the function of polysaccharide and its potential is limited. Solid cultivation is filling various grains into plastic bag or container as medium for higher yield. It produces some kinds of triterpene with more complete features than that from liquid fermentation. However, the production rate is not stable, and it is hard to separate fungi from its medium. Therefore, the grain medium is usually harvested simultaneously causing less than 5% recovery of Antrodia cinnamomea. As a result, total activity is decreasing, and the cultivation time is as long as 3˜4 months. Wood cultivation is using Cinnamomum kanehirae Hay. to culture Antrodia cinnamomea, which is used to solve the stealing problem of Cinnamomum kanehirae and Antrodia cinnamomea without real benefit. The problems with wood cultivation includes 1˜2 years of growth period, limited source of wood, and extreme quality variation between each lot leading to unstable product quality. Due to current shortcoming and limitation of Antrodia cinnamomea cultivation, the present invention is applying gel medium to cultivate Antrodia cinnamomea in corporation with screening platform to obtain Antrodia cinnamomea with cancer cell growth inhibition, liver protection and other activities through medium modification. The advantage of the present invention is not only eliminating the medium effect on its function and higher fungal purity, shortening cultivation time (1˜1.5 month), and reducing the contamination chances during long cultivation time, but also improving space circulation for improving unit production rate, and lowering cost.